Here are the 11 dirtiest places on your plane

Here are the 11 dirtiest places on plane

Besides me, do you get excited about upcoming trip? Let me share with you that, due to excitement on the day of my flight I don’t get tired, hungry and/or sleepy etc. I am sure many others too have the same feeling whether they are occasional or regular travelers? We just want to reach airport and be in the plane. If you travel for business you are aware of the feeling. However for others I thing feeling is the same. Due to excitement we forget a lot of things that are happening on board. These things may include boarding lines, wait times, over head bin availability, tight seats, good seats, bad seats, ugly seats, dirty seats. What did I just say “Dirty Seats”. Yes, “Dirty Seats”. Do you know what are the dirtiest places on a plane? Here are the 11 dirtiest places on your plane. Let me give you their description and what can you do about it?

Your seat

Armrest

Armrest is a very dirty place, which is a part of your seat. Do you know who was sitting there before you? How do you know that person didn’t have any skin disease? Can you imagine someone seating on the same seat before you with a bad skin disease? Yuck, even writing and imagining makes me puke. Now think about this what else this person touched?

TV Screen

That same person used his hands to play with the screen touching every button possible on that screen starting from turning on to whatever. Now picture someone resting his head against the same screen so that they can sleep? Gross is the word comes to my mind.

Sitting area

you are fine with the seat as it gets vacuumed between flights. I don’t think anyone can to put their dirty face on the seat and make it UN-hygienic. However what if someone spilled milk on it? What if someone spilled something else on it (I am not going to name anything but babies do come to my mind)?

Headrest

What about someone with dandruff or those little animals, you know?

Food tray

This is the “DIRTIEST AND HIGHLY GROSS” place on the plane behind the toilets. Now picture this? An infant sitting or lying on the tray without a diaper. Suddenly he deals with nature’s call on the tray. Mom Pop cleans the table with a napkin and that’s it. For the next flight plane gets cleaned, cleaners will remove the trash, seats are generally vacuumed and new stuff brought into. And I guarantee you nobody cleans these trays. Do you know why? Because 1. nobody cares, 2. they don’t have time to clean the plane like their home, 3. there is no need. Next flight someone is sitting on that seat is now having food on the same tray. (Puke feeling again here). After he or she completes the meal, this passenger is trying to sleep and is using the same tray as a head rest so that he/she can go to sleep. Oh wow, how gross is it to just think about it? And maybe some of us have actually done this in the past. Don’t worry, at the end I have some valuable points to tell you how to not worry about these problems.

Head phones and if there is a TV screen remote

What do you think, the head phones are brand new every time you are in a flight? OR do you think they get washed/cleaned in between flight? No Sir! Airlines don’t clean these head phones. They are simply sent to their packaging department where they are packaged again for future flights. I won’t write anything however you can imagine how hygienic they are, every time you use them.

Here are the 11 dirtiest places on your plane

Toilets

In my opinion this is the most un-hygienic place on the earth. In this case in the plane. What are you planning to do? Not go to washroom? That is the best policy, however may not exist for long haul flights. Are you able to live without going for natures call on a 15 hour flight from Los Angeles to Dubai? Or even a 6 hour flight? Specially when I say drink a 250 ML water bottle every hour? I guess not. I am not going to explain what is dirty in the toilet, instead I will ask you a question. What is not dirty in the toilet? Can someone tell me so that next time I don’t worry about the toilets on the plane?

Overhead bin handles

They are not the dirtiest however they are very dirty. And there is nothing, absolutely nothing you can do about them.

Windows

Another dirtiest place on the plane. I have seen passengers drooling while they use windows as a head rest. What a view and what a feeling (puke). Ewwww

Magazines

I bet you never thought magazines and other reading material is really un-hygienic? Think about this, some of the printed material such as emergency instructions have been in the plane since the plane started flying. The in-flight magazine gets new version about every 3 months. Unless you are the 1st one to read that magazine you are out of luck. In addition to other things a lot of people have the habit of using natural moisture (tongue) to flip pages. You know where am I going? You got the point.

Pillow and Blankets

Pillows and blankets gets washed once in 6 months. Correct me if I am wrong about this? They are very dirty in my opinion. Airlines are cutting costs and cleaning and washing millions of pillows and blankets is not an option airlines like.

Do these to stay hygienic

Solution for seat and surrounding parts of the seat – Not flying is not the solution. Don’t even try this unless you are going equivalent of 1 hour of flight time or so. Ignoring the problem is never the solution. You need to face the problem and for this problem your best buddy is “good quality wipes”. How to use these wipes depends upon where you start? You can’t clean the over head bin handles. Other passengers will have negative thinking about you. Some might think that you are the problem not realizing you are cleaning the handles for everyone. So don’t bother about them. For them keep a hand sanitizer (in addition to wipes), which you use anytime you touch something dirty. After you enter the plane and sit, use wipes to clean armrest, then your seat buttons, window and surrounding area (if you are in the window seat), TV screen and then food tray. If I missed something, clean that too. After that when you receive head phones, clean them too before using them. Best possible solution is that you carry your own head phones that are capable of noise cancellation.

Solution for toilets

I don’t have a tested or tried solution. What I do is, I keep napkins with me and when I have to go to toilet, I don’t use bare hands to open the toilet, I use that napkin. Inside whatever I touch, I remain mindful of not touching anything with my bare hands. I wash my hands constantly and use napkin to open the washroom door from inside. When I reach my seat, I either use wipe to clean my hands or use hand sanitizer to clean my hands.

Solution for reading material – I don’t read the material found in the plane. I bring my reading material on board. This way I know who touched my books and stuff.

Solution for pillows and blankets – First of all either bring your own travel pillow or I use airline pillow with the packaging. I don’t remove the plastic cover of the pillow. This way I am able to use pillow and avoid dirt all around the pillow. Either I don’t use the blanket or I bring my blanket for long haul flights. See what works for you?

In conclusion, I am not trying to scare you or anything. I just want you have a pleasant and hygienic flight, that’s all. In my opinion, “Hygienic Flight is pleasant flight”.